Lattice can't wait to demo "Mobile Innovation"

I just heard from the folks who don the undergarments of authority and stride the corridors of power in Lattice Semiconductor's top-secret underground bunker that they will be hosting a private meeting suite at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) January 8-11 in Las Vegas.

It seems they will be demonstrating several new FPGA-based design solutions for consumer and mobile devices. Lattice suite 2980 will be located in the East Tower of the Las Vegas Hotel. To register for a specific time to visit with Lattice and discuss how mobile innovation can help with your specific design challenges, please visit Lattice Mobile Innovation.

Quick, call Max and tell him what's going on (but make sure he knows to keep it secret … Ooops!)

With their small form factors, low power consumption and low cost, Lattice’s iCE40 and MachXO2 FPGAs are being widely adopted in the design of mobile devices and consumer electronics products such as smart phones, tablets, e-readers, digital cameras and flat panel TVs, among others. Programmable FPGAs are an ideal design solution for the rapidly changing consumer market, because they allow manufacturers to differentiate their products quickly and easily.

“Only Lattice is enabling continuous mobile innovation with the lowest power, smallest form factor FPGAs available for mobile and consumer product design,” said Harry Raftopoulos, Lattice Senior Director of Consumer Marketing. “Using our FPGAs, designers are free to innovate without waiting for the next generation of application processors, and this means their products get to market faster with the features consumers want today.” A new breed of FPGAs for mobile innovationThe relentless demand to design consumer and mobile products with new and differentiating features produces very short product development cycles, and the pressure to meet these schedules leads to more reliance on standard chips – i.e. fully loaded application processors. But this creates a dilemma: application processor chipsets take two to three years to develop, which means that any device available today was defined two or three years ago – and that, given the breakneck pace of consumer demand, is an eternity.

So, what is the designer of consumer and mobile products to do? In order to meet unforgiving schedules, readily available chipsets must be used. But yesterday’s application processors often fail to meet today’s market demands.

One approach would be to use an FPGA as a “companion” to the application processor, enabling designers to respond to contemporary consumer demand without waiting years for new chipsets. But, until recently, this was not an option. FPGAs were simply too big, too expensive and too power-hungry for use in consumer devices.

Now, however, ultra-low density FPGAs like the Lattice MachXO2 and iCE40 devices are specifically targeted at the needs of small, inexpensive, power-sensitive consumer devices. This new breed of FPGA can be used to supplement an application processor and enable designers to pursue continuous “mobile innovation.”

Hands-on examples of mobile innovationIn the Lattice suite, visitors will have the opportunity to speak directly with Lattice senior executives and technical specialists about their own design requirements, in addition to viewing demonstrations of design solutions that leverage Lattice’s broad portfolio of ultra-low density FPGA devices, including:

MIPI CSI-2 image sensor bridge solution that enables low cost, high quality image sensors to be used in applications such as home security cameras

Conversion algorithm that converts standard 2D video to simulated 3D video without the need for glasses

Image sensor extender for remotely locating a camera up to 10 meters from an ISP – ideal for adding a camera on top of a large screen TV

To register for a specific time to visit with Lattice and discuss how mobile innovation can help with your specific design challenges, please visit Lattice Mobile Innovation.

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